In Harlem, Bradhurst Plaza Supporters Struggle to Change Status Quo

Bradhurst Plaza would turn a dangerous slip lane into a new public space. Image: Harlem CDC [PDF]

Manhattan Community Board 10’s transportation committee ended months of foot-dragging this week by backing a road diet for Morningside Avenue in Harlem. It’s not quite a brand new day at CB 10 though: A community effort to convert a short, irregular block into a public plaza still has an uphill climb at the Harlem board. While there’s a substantial local coalition backing the project, a cadre of outspoken opponents use the existing street as a drop-off zone for their apartment building and don’t want to see any changes.

The intersection of Frederick Douglass Boulevard and Macombs Place near 150th Street is a tricky place to walk. Drivers heading north on Frederick Douglass can veer right, making a high-speed turn onto Macombs Place. Walking across the street is risky: The long, low-visibility intersection doesn’t have a crosswalk and is usually clogged with illegally parked cars. Within one block of the plaza site, there were 30 collisions resulting in five injuries from August 2011 to June 2013, according to NYPD data compiled by plaza advocates.

The effort to bring a plaza to the space is led by Harlem Congregations for Community Improvement, HERBan Farmers’ Market, the Bradhurst Merchants Association, and Harlem Community Development Corporation, a unit of Empire State Development.

They have gathered nearly 300 signatures for the plaza and secured support for their application to DOT’s plaza program from, among others, Bethany Baptist Church, the Polo Grounds Towers Resident Association, Council Member Inez Dickens, former Council Member Robert Jackson, WE ACT for Environmental Justice, Transportation Alternatives, and Harlem Hospital Center [PDF].

Last July, the coalition held a town hall meeting at Jackie Robinson Recreation Center that attracted dozens of people to discuss the plaza idea. In October, they hosted a one-day plaza demonstration on a Thursday afternoon, featuring free food and activities like tai chi demonstrations. Surveys from participants that day showed mixed feelings about whether the current intersection is dangerous, but overwhelming support for creating a plaza there.

Tupacamaru Tiwoni is the founder of HERBan Farmers Market, which operates weekly on Mount Morris Park West and would expand to Bradhurst Plaza. She also lives with her children right next to the plaza site in the Dunbar Apartments, where she was raised. “If you support a safer place to cross the street in this area, if you support an outdoor space that strengthens community… I urge you to vote in support of this project,” she told the committee. “We want to bring fresh food to this community… It’s my community. It’s home to me.”

The plaza coalition was looking for the board to support eight one-day demonstrations on weekends this summer, to build momentum for a permanent plaza design by DOT.

“If the community board supports this, we want to have a design charrette, which is a visioning session, and have the community come up with some ideas of how they would like to see that spot beautified,” said Tom Lunke, director of planning and development at Harlem CDC.

Opponents, led by the Dunbar Residents Association and a pair of nearby block associations, don’t want that to happen. They picketed the demonstration plaza last October and would like to see the street remain the way it is, suggesting the farmers market instead set up in Jackie Robinson Park.

“People are trying to shove this thing down our throats,” said Bobby Jones, president of the Dunbar Residents Association, adding that he had 700 signatures on a petition against the plaza. He claimed that a plaza would make it difficult for Access-A-Ride vehicles and school buses to drop off children or the disabled. With the plaza, the closest curb to the building would be just a few feet farther away than it is now. “To interfere with their ability to be picked up or dropped off, that’s tragic,” he said.

Even though he lives in the same building as Tiwoni, who is hoping to bring a farmers market to the plaza, Jones claimed that plaza supporters were either misinformed or not local residents. “What they did is they got a bunch of vicious people not from our neighborhood,” Jones said, “and a few residents from our neighborhood, and they misinformed them.”

On the board, the most outspoken opponent was Barbara Nelson, who objected to the loss of parking and said the plaza would restrict emergency access (the concept plan includes a fire lane).

In the end, the acting chair of the transportation committee, Karen Horry, negotiated a plan to hold three or four one-day plaza demonstrations, not eight, and to host another town hall forum to allow the public to offer feedback on the demonstrations and gauge support for a permanent design.

The solution did not please Jones, who wanted to see the plaza proposal rejected entirely, but supporters saw it as progress. “This is a big step,” Tiwoni said after the meeting. “That they’re willing to let us try is wonderful.”

Stephen Miller
is a reporter for Streetsblog NYC. He has been covering the movement for safer streets, effective transit, and livable cities since 2012.

Having a pedestrian plaza instead of a roadbed for cars would make it difficult for children and the disabled? LOL

Sounds like a few people who want to get from a car to their front door without having to open an umbrella, at the cost of a potential neighborhood amenity. The typical resident of this neighborhood that they are claiming to represent doesnt even own a car much less have Upper East Side style dropoff service.

Theyre stoking fears of gentrification and outsiders in order to serve themselves at the expense of everyone else. Hopefully local residents aren’t falling for it.

Mark Walker

I’m awestruck by all the hard work that must have gone into building this plaza coalition, uniting all those groups and individuals.

Andrew

Couldn’t Macombs Place north of 150th also be narrowed? That first block is one-way, but it’s as wide as the two-way-with-median street north of 151st.

Mark

I don’t particularly like that drawing, it makes the intersection seem much smaller than it is. And Macombs already has angled parking, that’s why it’s so wide.

This is the direct route to get from Central Park West/Friedrich Douglas Blvd over to a bridge to the Bronx. If you eliminate it you need some form of traffic mitigation for all the vehicles you’re forcing up to 152nd to get to the bridge, don’t you?

Charles

What are you even talking about? Macombs Place northbound doesn’t connect directly to the bridge, there is no angled parking on this block of Macombs, and finally, nothing would stop drivers under this scheme from making a right on 150th and then a quick left on Macombs.

Charles

Looks like a no-brainer. The building entrance is actually very close to the existing intersection of Frederick Douglass and Macombs, so only a few feet would be added to the walk from the curb under this plan.

Any building set back behind a plaza on private property, of which there are many in the city, already has a comparable distance to the curb from its main entrance if not a greater one. I have never heard of anyone suffering any kind of injury because they had to walk or be transported across a plaza to get to a building entrance.

Mark

You’re right about the bridge, I looked at that to quickly.
The angled parking is on the block above it, I know that.

And allowing the right left would almost be worse, no? Now you have cars making a sharp s curve with limited sight lines to pedestrians, and you have to start looking at split phase lights to mitigate the conflict since a car making that turn now crosses through 3 crosswalks.

If this plan goes forward, I don’t see allowing the right onto 150th and then immediate left as a safer design, just a more confusing one.

bolwerk

I always love how pedestrian plazas and better transit are simultaneously supposed to impoverish and gentrify neighborhoods.

Harlem 911

Please come to the neighborhood, look at the site and a discussion with those whom would be directly affected. Additionally, we already have people sitting in this area and loitering daily.